I know I've been neglecting this blog for quite a while, probably a week or so, but I have a really good reason to back me up. That is, I have been helping out for the Global Communication Program (GCP) for my course. This program host exchanges from Japan to Singapore and vice versa. It's a week long program scheduled with activities. And for this year's program (which is pretty much similar to last year's according to the seniors), we would join the Japanese students for their field trips around Singapore and finally, a presentation made by each groups.
I joined Team D for their stay in Singapore and I must say, it's the best group ever. They are a bunch of funny and cute people, especially the leader and the supervising teacher. One week is really too short, I wish you guys could stay in Singapore longer.
I didn't take a lot of photos because I'm not a photo person but anyway, here's my group!
Ike, Me, Rieko, Alan (tall guy at the back), Shi Hui, Ke Wei (Not our group, there to be an extra), Emiko and Tomo.
Although, we weren't really close at first but I'm glad we got really close in the end and had a great time together! This makes me wanna go to Japan even more next year! During the second day of GCP, the teacher-in-charge told me that next year, we might get to go to either Europe or Japan. When I first heard that, I told him to arrange for Europe without a second thought. But now, I hope that I get to go to Japan next year, I don't want to go to Europe for GCP anymore.
Anyway, here are more photos:
We helped them with their project and presentation. Their theme was Urban Green and they did an excellent job. (I just went to facebook and found some photos uploaded by them! Woohoo!)
So, day 1: They arrived at NP during evening, so a couple of us escorted them to their rooms at loft and after they have settled, we went out for dinner. :) Nothing much on the first day.
Day 2: We had a welcome session at the classroom I decorated. *smug look on my face*
Look at the whiteboard. The wordings are written with such creativity. They are not entirely written by me though, gotta credit the seniors and friends that helped! :)
It's not too bad, right? And the whiteboard with the wordings is pretty, too, right? C'mon, admit it. Hahahaha. Anyway, there's some presentation about Singapore and Japan during this welcome session and it's pretty interesting.
Then, there's self-introduction among the group members.
She's the leader of group D, Rieko Sato. And she's super lovely and cute!
I was caught using my phone. Oops.
Candid~
A game was set up by the staffs from Japan and it's similar to the card-memorising game with a little twist. The cars are arranged under a certain rule/pattern, so we get points according to the pairs we opened and whether we can find the odd one out. It's a really interesting game!
After that was lunch and after lunch was visiting at the City Gallery.
The miniature of Singapore at the City Gallery.
Having fun.
After that was back to NP to have a mini-party (BBQ).
Using eye power.
I remembered we took a photo together at the end of the BBQ session but I couldn't find it on facebook anyway, here's a photo we took after breakfast:
Day 3: We went to Marina Bay Area and caught sight of the Customs House by chance, it's one of the places the group wanna visit. Thus, it became our first station and then Marina Bay City Gallery and Gardens By the Bay afterwards.
Doing some planning for the day~
We were quite disappointed actually. They saw pictures of it on the net and thought it would be a great place to visit to study more about urban green but in the end, there's not much except for a wall with small plants planted on it. Yeah, that's all.
A miniature of Marina Bay area with interactive light options.
We met group A while we walked from Marina Bay Sands to Gardens by the Bay. :)
We had to let the balloons we got from a Cafe Fest going on at Marina Bay fly because we can't bring it inside the dome.
And that's the end of day three. The souvenir shop at Gardens by the Bay had some really weird smelling tea bags for sale. Some are too strong. some smell like wine and cider. All in all, it was pleasantly fun. :)
Day 4: It's a free day and we went to Sentosa, Siloso Beach to play with the water and have fun! In the afternoon, we went to Bugis area to do some shopping. I didn't take any photos that day and nor did the photographer followed us. So, no photos, sorry.
Day 5: We went to the Pinnacle @ Duxton and the National Design Centre after that.
It's a 50-storey high skyscraper with a sky bridge at the top connecting all 7 wings of the building.
My candid photos are not bad, huh.
Group photo!
Look at all those beautiful views, are you jealous yet? Hahahha.
These leaves are from the rooftop sky bridge of the Pinnacle and I remember my secondary school used to have this kind of tree. They are right outside the band room and my batch mates and I would pluck out some of the leaves because we had nothing else better to do.
At the design centre, the seniors had nothing else better to do and decided to build a tower with the materials provided.
This was an unexpected meet-up with a famous designer for buildings with urban green and we had a mini-Q&A session with him.
That's pretty much it for day five, after the visit to Design Centre, we went back to NP and helped out with their miniature of their idea of an urban green city. It was fun creating those buildings and trees for the miniature!
Day 6: We didn't go anywhere today because they didn't find the need to as they needed to finish up on their miniature city.
Day 7: It's the presentation day!
I still hate presentations.
The completed version of the miniature urban green city. :D
After the presentation was a mini-party put up by the staffs from the Japan side. :)
They are showing off some Kendo moves.
After the closing ceremony ended, it was free time till 10, which means the Japanese can go anywhere in Singapore and be back in the loft by 10. So I accompanied Ike and Emiko to Orchard area and we split up half way because Ike and Emiko wanted to go to different places. But anyway, it was great fun! I'm saddened that they had to leave Singapore tomorrow though, I wished I can spend more time with them. They are such lovelies! ;(
Day 8: The day they had to leave Singapore to return to Japan.
The final group photo...
Even though I smiled so widely in this photo, you have no idea how sad I am inside. And although it's just a short period of one week, the bonds I formed with them were already so strong. I seriously hoped they could stay longer. Departure is always so difficult. I wanna go to Japan and see them!
I miss them already.
